Implied Nonacceptance
by dahan
Summary: Rodney's latest project doesn't sit too well with Elizabeth. Some things get resolved, but not really... Short McWeir insert to Hotzone. Be thankful to S1 DVDs [OneShot] Feedback Welcomed.


First attempt at SGA fanfiction here! And the first fic I've written in years… I wonder if I still know what I'm doing…scratch that, I NEVER DID!

Disclaimer: Stargate Atlantis is far too good a show for me to have anything to do with it, hence I own nothing and please don't sue. (A/N: is it weird that I miss doing these disclaimers?)

This is an insert to "Hotzone" in Season 1, hence spoilers up to there. I'm sure you can figure out where this goes when you finish reading. (In case you can't tell, that's a subtle beg for people to read this)

Side note: Did I mention I always hated coming up with titles:p

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# Implied Nonacceptance #

With a disarray of tablets, PDA's, and even scraps of paper all scattered about the deserted and eerily quiet lab, Rodney McKay was quietly referencing the individual data devices while he was typing away on his laptop. This in itself was not unusual in the least for the doctor's little corner of Atlantis. When not dealing with an immediate crisis, such as the terrifying events of the past few hours, one would often expect him to be in this room, at his usual lab bench, curiously and diligently working on some research project or another. The last item being the exception in this current case…

Although his concentration was waning, no doubt due to exhaustion from recent events, Rodney pressed on in his attempt to finish his little personal project as soon as possible. He had started it almost immediately after he had been cleared from the infirmary and it had all but consumed him in the last few hours.

"Rodney." Greeted a smiling Elizabeth Weir making her way into the lab and around his workbench.

Glancing up from one of the many PDA's for only a moment, Rodney acknowledged and greeted her with his usual shortened version of her name, before returning to his work.

"Shouldn't you be resting?" questioned Elizabeth as she picked up one of the scraps of paper and quizzically examined the obviously hastily scribbled down notes.

The entire expedition had been ordered to the infirmary after the all-curing nuclear explosion. Although there was still a lot of aftermath to be dealt with, mainly fried electronics that had been left on, those who were in Rodney's original survey team were ordered to take it easy for at least the day.

"I will, I will" came the rushed answer, "I just wanted to make sure I got this all down while it was still fresh in my mind."

Noticing that he wasn't giving her his full attention for their conversation, Elizabeth smiled and made her way to Rodney's side to peer over his shoulder and look upon the laptop screen that currently held his attention. Reacting to her incoming presence in almost a rehearsed manor, Rodney shifted and rotated himself to allow Elizabeth greater access to the screen without even tearing his hands from their task of typing. After taking a moment to understand Rodney's work in vain she decided she needed some clarification in his latest undertaking.

"Care to fill me in?" she asked referring to the screen.

Rodney's eyes were still darting across the notebook screen checking the last few lines of text he had entered. He was still passively ignoring Elizabeth and she in turn couldn't help but let her smile grow slightly wider from a humorous guilt in disturbing his diligence.

Finally turning to face her, Rodney simply asked, "I don't suppose you've talked to Ford or Zelenka regarding my imminent death outburst have you?"

Rodney, having been off radio at the time of his deathbed confession, had spared the majority of populace from his fear-laced bits of wisdom and somewhat fictional obituary.

Elizabeth herself was thankful to have heard 'of'' it, rather than to have heard the live performance. She was particularly thankful in finding out about it only after all was well again too. That being said, she light heartedly replied, "something about bravely saving a bunch of kids...and not caring…I believe…" a reply that gained her a stare from Rodney along with finally earning his full attention.

"Well yes, yes, there was that, there was also…" he gestured to the laptop screen. "…this." Seeing that Elizabeth was not fluent enough in techno-babble of which the screen currently consisted of, he eagerly went on to explain while directing her attention to the various items skewed across his lab bench.

"Power blackout schedules, Zed-PM charging ideas, interface upgrades to the Atlantis database, and various other ideas, notes, and procedures that are nowhere near ready for implementation but too brilliant to be forgotten…" he trailed off full of pride with a finger still hanging in the direction of the mess.

"Rodney?" interrupted Elizabeth who was growing slightly confused.

"Think of it as a compilation of Dr. McKay's greatest hits," he stated proudly while returning her attention to the laptop screen "various thoughts and ideas that should be thoroughly explored regardless of my absence. Kind of like a, like a 'will of wisdom' if you will."

"A will?" she asked surprisingly

"Well yes, sort of…" answered Rodney plainly.

There was a minor pause as Elizabeth absorbed what he was trying to do. She, of course, had heard about the rushed pieces of wisdom Rodney was trying to convey when his death seemed imminent. There was a minor hint of pride when she read it in Ford and Zelenka's preliminary reports. Now, however, when he and everyone else seemed ok, there was something…unsettling… about his current project.

"Don't you think that's a little…" she absent-mindedly trailed off.

Not exactly able to find the right words, Elizabeth stepped back from the lab bench somewhat. Silently, she held her hands together as she tried to choke down some unidentifiable emotions and gather her thoughts. Rodney who still had his attention directed at his screen abruptly ended his slew of keystrokes when he thought there might be a need to further explain.

"Well, given my long time game of chicken with the powers that be, I just thought that perhaps this would be a prudent course of action…Zelenka's good and everything but without me he'll probably need all the help he can get, should I ever…ah…"

There was definitely uneasiness in Rodney's voice when he realized there was no response whatsoever at his insert of humor into his explanation. However forced the joke had been, it still surprised him that it was unable to lift the heavy atmosphere that had befallen the deserted lab. He had hoped that once Elizabeth had a second to truly take in all that he was doing she would be fine with it. Upon a much longer pause than he expected, however, Rodney finally stopped working and turned to check on her. Contrary to what might be perpetuated, he wasn't entirely oblivious to those around him.

Elizabeth had folded her arms and was now shuffling nervously in the quiet lab. Rodney was slightly concerned at her sudden somber state. He had opened his mouth a few times with no words exiting whenever he thought he had something of comfort to say. Still, he was unsure of how to proceed. It took a few moments before he realized, that given the events of day, with so many people suddenly gone, it might have been better to have spared Elizabeth the details of what he was doing for another day.

Silently berating himself for being immensely stupid, he tried to apologize, while being thankful that no one else was in the lab to hear him do so of course.

"Eliza…"

"Rodney, when you… rather, if you …" Elizabeth stutteringly interrupted. "I'm sure your…" with each pause the tension in her voice went up a notch. Her shuffling was also now an erratic pacing. Rodney patiently observed and acknowledged each unfinished sentence with a nod and a look of encouragement for her to press on. It certainly would help if she would tell him anything else that was bothering her and whether if he should apologize for those as well.

Coming to a dead stop, Elizabeth simply faced him, pointed to the laptop and sternly said,

"I don't think you need to do this"

Referring his attention to the laptop for a moment and seeing the discomfort in Elizabeth, Rodney softly offered "Of course, of course, I guess I should probably have waited for things to get back to normal around here before I…"

"Rodney, you're not hearing me" interrupted Elizabeth "you **shouldn't** do this. At all!"

Taken back by the emotion-laced words, Rodney once again referred his attention to the screen and then back to Elizabeth. Confusion was clearly on his face that was quite contrary to the all too serious look on Elizabeth's.

"Elizabeth, I'm not sure you understand. This is just in case I…"

"Rodney, I understand perfectly, and I'm saying that we don't need it"

"I'm sure we won't, but just in case we do"

"We won't!"

"But…"

"Rodney!"

With Elizabeth's final outburst, the room fell silent. Elizabeth's gaze had shifted from Rodney's face to the floor. Her arms had wrapped around herself and she was silently hoping that she had sounded less emotional than she felt. Rodney's gaze still held a somewhat startled look; he himself was facing in the general direction of his lab bench.

Idly, his left hand found its way to tracing a certain scar on his right forearm. Both were at a lost of what to say and do and both were acutely aware of the resemblance of this exchange to one that took place at a certain grounding station so many days ago. They had never talked about that then, and given that all had ended well; there didn't seem a need to. At least, not at the time… Still not entirely sure of how to proceed, Rodney silently moved toward Elizabeth.

Uncomfortably showing his ignorance in these matters, he attempted to place a reassuring hand on her shoulder but then just stopped short. He then tried to offer some words of comfort but like before, his mind failed him. He started and stopped a great many things following that, and ultimately was growing more and more concerned and embarrassed at each attempt.

Wholly aware of his attempts of trying to be there for her, Elizabeth broke a smile while she was still averting his gaze. She had dug herself a small hole in allowing her emotions to come out like that and it was just amusing, in an odd sense, to see Rodney fumble through his attempts at getting her out. She knew very well that he hadn't done anything to earn whatever she had just given him, but at this point, she wasn't sure how to take it back.

Being alone like this was certainly a mixed blessing for the two of them. For one thing, neither of them would have ever gotten to their current states had there been other people in the room. Funny as it was, that was also the good thing…

Slowly, Elizabeth turned to face Rodney with her small smile still playing on her lips. At the sight of this, a feeling of great relief just washed over Rodney's face. Without knowing it, both began to laugh slightly, just a little bit, without really knowing why. There certainly was an absurdity in all this but neither really cared. The shared moment eventually came to a natural stop with both having a broad smile for the other.

A shared moment of silence later, Rodney answered a radio call from the good Dr. Beckett who asked whether he could assist in examining the remnants of the nano-virus. Seeing that the situation with Elizabeth was now resolved, for now, he felt he had leave to go and play with some really dangerous but thankfully dead machines.

It also helped that Elizabeth had given him a comforting nod acknowledging that it was ok.

Still, as bad as he was at this, Rodney still felt that he should probably offer something, anything, to this whole mess.

Pausing at the exit of his lab, he turned back to Elizabeth and softly stuttered,

"Lizabeth? Um…you don't have to…um…what I mean is…um…I'm not going anywhere ok?"

With another shared moment of silence and a warm and thankful look of assurance from Elizabeth, Rodney simply smiled and pointed down the hallway,

"I'm going to go help Carson now…"

and then took his leave.

Upon being alone, Elizabeth let loose a breath of relief. Mixed blessing indeed.

Casually, she made her way to Rodney's workbench and to the laptop that had initiated everything. Taking a moment and the seat where Rodney had been in, she took another breath and then with a few keystrokes deleted the file he had been working on. Smiling to herself, Elizabeth exited Rodney's lab knowing she would have at least one less thing in the back of her mind to worry about from now on.

The End

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That's all folks. Let me know what you think of it regardless of what you think of it. I do have a slight request for those thoughtful, kind, and oh so magnificently generous people who decide to leave some feedback though.

If you could just tell me who's POV you think I was heavier on (or equal for both) I would greatly appreciate it.

Anyway, until next time!


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